Donna was our tour guide. Donna, a former school teacher, joined bus 4 on tuesday morning and led our team from Arlington cemetery through our last stop at the National Art Museum, on Friday. We covered a ton of ground together, mostly on foot and some by simply driving by on our bus. Pentagon City Mall was a favorite stop for lunch and on more than one occasion, I sought out Donna’s company with the sole purpose of picking her brain. Actually, this entire trip was a bit of a BTL practicum for yours truly. Funny, huh.
Every chance I got, I focused on studying the bus 4 team and my roommate, Tim. Not in a stalking kinda way, mind you.
Insatiably curious. Insatiably curious.
I learned a ton. Here’s one small footnote. This curiosity was not reciprocated. Not even close. Not even a sniff. Nobody cared to learn a single thing about why I was there and nobody wanted to hear my story. My son, Taylor, actually tried to avoid me. This took some time to understand and process, even though the facts were rather obvious. Funny, huh.
In fact, I didn’t share a single piece of data with the bus 4 team. I bit my tongue till it bled. I stayed in the back of the bus and observed. I played my role and didn’t even attempt to coach the leaders, Jen and Corrine or the head of the system, Karen. I simply asked questions and did my best to serve the 8 rooms that represented my assignment. Moving on.
Over a meal with Donna, however, I asked her a couple questions that caused her to pause. Her eyes told me that she loved that I wanted to learn. She’s, in fact, still a teacher. What group of folks ask the best questions, I posed between bites of some kind of chicken something. Donna spun around to face me and instantly respond.
Fourth graders, she blurted out as if startled into speaking.
Fourth graders. I responded with, “tell me more.”
“Because they are old enough to know what needs to be clarified, and they’re too young to care what others might think,” she added.
What groups do it right, was my next question. Equally as instantly she popped out, the Europeans!!
The Europeans, you see, are ready to take it in. When they bring a class of 8th graders to DC, they come ready to get after it. They bus them into Arlington Cemetery and from there they WALK. They walk everywhere. This, naturally, slows them down. They can’t take in 7-10 museums, memorials, or places of interest per day. They get to, maybe, three. They have time to process in between their jolts of learning. They have time to let the brain clear. AND, they have time to socialize slowly as they journey through the streets and avenues of the District of Columbia. Funny, huh.
Who knew that two questions could extrapolate to a learning explosion?
Who knew. Slow down and let this process. Slow down and reflect. Take some time before going to the questions that follow, and extrapolate to your work and life…
Why are we so afraid of what others think?
Why do we try to cram so much into so little?
Why do we think our 8th graders or our 8 year associates can process their learning while performing another task?
Why is three stretches our limit when it comes to caring for our injured bodies?
Why does four cause us to not want to do even one the next day?
Why, as leaders, do we ignore the early indicators that our team is disconnected from our vision and, instead, think they just need to see one more museum or one more piece of analytics to do the trick?
Why?
Tell me more, my friend.
Tell me more…
BUILT TO LEAD 